AMERICANS AT THE POLLS

Chronicle (Levin), 3 November 1948, Page 5

AMERICANS AT THE POLLS

(N.Z.P.A.-

^■Beuter,

Defeat Of Truman Regarded As Inevitable

Copyright)

Received Wednesday, 11.15 a.m. NEW YORK, November 2, Generally, good weather preyailed throughout the country today as an estimated 51,000,000 Americans went to the polls to vote fpr the new President, Vice-President, members of the Senate and House, State Governors and othef officials. Mr. Truman's defeat is regarded as inevitable ""because of Mr. Wallaee on the left and Mr. Thurmond on the right, speaking away frOm the official Democratic Party and theref'ore improving Mr. Dewey's prospects. Votes for Mr. Wallaee,- Mr. Thurmond," and the Socialist, Mr. Norman Thomas, will therefore take.the form of protests rather than serious expectations of a Presidential victory.

The Progressive Party candidate, Mr. Henry Wallaee, was the first of the leading contestants to cast his vote. He voted at Lewis Borough, New York State, just after 8 a.m. Mr. Norman Thomas, in his sixth bid as Socialist candidate for the Presidency, exchanged pleasantries with a reporter as he voted in New York, but declined to estimate what vote he would receive. On the orders of the United Mineworkers' president, Mr. John L. Lewis, 100,000 bituminous and 78,000 anthracite coal miners took today off to vote. Mr. Lewis has indicated a preference for Mr. Dewey. \Toting is heavy throughout Pennsylvania. It is estimated that approximately 80 per cent of Pennsylvania's 4,748,000 registered voters will appear at the polls. When Mr. Truman cast his vote at his home town, Independence, Missouri, report ers asked him how he ihought it was going. Mr. Truman replied, "It can't be anything but a victory."

Mr. Dewey voted in the basement of a school in the fashionable Park Avenue district of New York. If elected, Mr. Dewey, at 46 years of age, will be the youngest elected President in American history and the only President born during the present century. The population of the United States is now 146,000,000 or 26,000,000 greater than when President Hoover, last Republican President, was elected in 1928. Mr. Dewey is the only Republican ever nominated for a second time after an electoral defeat. Red Indians are able today, for the first time, to vote in all States. America's total Indian population is about 400,000. The first community in the United States to report the vote of its citizens for President was the liltle village of Harts, located in

jNew Hampshire, where a special .effort was made to have all voters vote in the first hour. The count showed a big gain by Mr. Dewey, he getting eleven votes to Mr. Truman's one, compared with a" vote of Mr. Dewey four, the late President Roosevelt six, in 1944. At Paris, Kentucky, the sheriff reported that a ballot box containing 17 Democratic votes was found when the polls opened in one subdivision. A Republican scrutineer found the ballot papers when his suspicions were aroused by a rustling noise in the box. Television stations are giving a full cover of the elections. Voters in one New York area protested to the police when a Democratic scrutineer flaunted a handoainted tie with, a picture of Mr. Truman on it. The scrutineer refused to remove the tie, but. after a heated argument with the police he compromised by turning his icoat lapels to cover Mr. Truman's features.

By 5 p.m. New York time, scattered and inconclusive returns from 23 cities, mainly in Tekas, Kansas and New England, showed the aopular vote in the Presidential ballot as: — Mr. Truman, 11,555; Mr. Dewey, 10,587; Mr. Thurmond, 3634, and Mr. Wallaee, 83. The winning Presidential candidate will probably not know until Thursday whether he will have to work with a Republican or Democratic Senate. The Senatorial results in the ten key States are expected to be very close. These are Oklahoma, Minnesota, West Virginia, Kentucky, Iowa and Wyoming, where the Republican seats are at stake, and Tennesse, Montana, Colorado, and New Mexico, where the Democratic incumbents are threatened. The .Democrats need to gain four seats ,to control the Senate.